Periodically I troll certain databases plugging in various ancestors' names to see if any new hits appear. So a couple days ago I put "Joel Vaughn" into GenealogyBank, a website with digitized old newspapers. I didn't get anything new on my Joel, but I read the following news item with amazement:
Jackson Citizen Patriot, June 13, 1884, p. 1
What a family tree this would be! Even though this is not my family, I instantly tried to see if I could find him in the 1880 U.S. Census, the closest one to the publication date of the article. Though I checked for Joel Vaughns in Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, which all could be interpreted as close to Cincinnati, I didn't have any luck. I tried the spelling Vaughan instead. Nada.
Scowling, I returned to the list of hits on GenealogyBank where I had found the article. It was then I noticed that very similar pieces had run in several U.S. newspapers. In those days because there were no news services like United Press International, newspapers around the country simply reprinted articles they liked from other newspapers, giving credit to the source somewhere, usually either at the beginning or the end. Most of the particulars were the same in all the versions, such as the number of spouses and children. What varied was the geographical area that this man was supposed to live in . Most of the other accounts listed him as living "near Seneca City, SC." One listed the location as Seneca, N.C.! I suppose Cincinnati sounds a bit like Seneca City if one strains the imagination a bit. Perhaps a harried typesetter had someone else reading him the piece, and he was a bit hard of hearing, and/or the noisy presses were going.
Regardless of how the error occurred, I now had a new location to search. So back to Ancestry I went. Seneca, South Carolina is located in Oconee County, in the northwest portion of the state. Eventually I pulled up a record for a Joel L. "Vaghn" household in Liberty, Pickens, South Carolina. The distance between Liberty and Seneca is about 20 miles. Here's the household:
Joel L. Vaghn Self M 68 SC
Heneretta Vaghn Wife F 49 SC
Sarah B. Vaghn Dau F 16 SC
Helena Vaghn Dau F 12 SC
John R. Vaghn Son M 9 SC
Nancy Morton Stepdaughter F 18 SC
William Morton Stepson M 17 SC
Ah ha! Here is an older husband with a blended family. I think this is my man. And so I kept digging. I found him in the 1840, 1850 and 1860 censuses for Laurens County, SC, as well as this one for Pickens County in 1880. However, much to my frustration, I cannot find him in South Carolina in 1870, not under any possible name variant or misspelling. This very prolific gentleman turns out to be Joel Leroy Vaughn, born about 1811, probably in Laurens County. After much consulting of what's out there on trees and message boards, much of which seems confused and incomplete, and poring over the available census records, I have thus far concluded that there is evidence for establishing the identityof three of his wives: Sarah "Sallie" Lucinda Moore, Sarah "Sallie" A. Johnson, and Henrietta Burts. Note: these are the maiden names of the women. Many researchers list them on trees under their married names because the second and third were widows when Joel married them. His final wife with the nursing infant mentioned in that 1884 article are still unknown. Exact years of death and marriage dates to his wives are also unknown. Some researchers suggest them, but it's always unsourced information. Part of the problem is that marriage records did not start until 1911 in South Carolina.
Another complicating wrinkle is that at the end of his life Joel moved to Duluth, Gwinnett County, Georgia near Atlanta. Several researchers think he died there in May 1889. I did find this transcription of an obituary that someone thoughtfully posted online:
Obituary of VAUGHN, JOEL LEROY 1889 Oconee, SC
Keowee Courier, August 1, 1889
Died at Duluth, Ga., in May, 1889, Mr. Joel L. Vaughn, aged about ninety
years. Mr. Vaughn was a native of this county, and formerly lived in Jocassee
Valley. He had been living in Georgia two or more years. He has a large
family connection in Oconee who will regret to hear of his death.
I think this is good information except for the fact that Oconee County was not formed until 1864, much later than his birth. It was formed from Laurens County, so that must be his birthplace. Also, I think his age was exaggerated because his birth year is consistently listed in four U.S. Censuses as being about 1811, which means he was about 78 or so when he died. Likewise his age was exaggerated in the newspaper article about his large family.Adding up all the children contained in those census enumerations, keeping in mind that I do not have the data for 1870, has only located 18 of his purported 27 natural children. There is a 19th who is mentioned on a couple trees, a Lousetta/Lucetta, but I do not think that the evidence linking her to Joel has been presented yet. I think it would be an exciting project, not to mention a service to the thousands of descendants out there, to try to crowdsource complete family group sheets for Joel Leroy Vaughn and his numerous wives and children. I have attached sources and tweaked the information listed for him on FamilyTree on www.familysearch.org. His identification number is LVGG-Q6L. I challenge the genealogical community to find the sources and facts to do so!
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